"The GNOME Foundation has issued a statement in response to recent accusations that it has been supporting the acceptance of Microsoft's Office Open XML format as an ECMA standard at the expense of the Open Document Format, the open standard used by OpenOffice.org, KOffice and other free software office applications. However, whether the statement's attempt at logical rebuttal will do anything to reduce the emotions or altruism behind the criticisms is anybody's guess."

If there were some sort of international regulatory body that could force Microsoft not to use OOXML as its default file format in MS Office unless it's accepted as an ISO standard, then maybe I'd agree with you.

But Microsoft is only pushing for ISO approval as a half-hearted nod to the "rest of the software ecosystem", and if they can't lie, cheat, and steal their way to official standardization, then becoming a de facto standard will be alright on them.

In fact, if their competitors don't want OOXML to be a standard, then Microsoft has every business incentive to make it a moving target in retribution. "Hey, you guys didn't want a standard, so enjoy chasing our tail lights."

The free software idealists' stance is similar to boycotting an election. Great, you stood by your principles, and now you get to live under the most repressive regime.

The outcome of this format war is obvious: it's a game of chicken to decide which format becomes the pivot, and it's Microsoft's Hummer vs. everybody else on motor scooters. The free software community needs to support OOXML more than Microsoft needs to support ODF.

To quote David Addington, Dick Cheney's chief legal counsel: "We're going to push and push and push until some larger force makes us stop." Show me the larger force that's going to prevent Microsoft from pushing OOXML and maybe then the free software community can afford to shun it.